


Shadows

by Dragonflies_and_Katydids



Series: Off Label [6]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Dubious Consent, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Masochism, Rough Sex, Self-Destruction, Self-Harm, Torture, Very rough sex, sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-19
Updated: 2016-01-19
Packaged: 2018-05-14 15:58:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5749306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dragonflies_and_Katydids/pseuds/Dragonflies_and_Katydids
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The night after Taliesin's death.</p><p>Zevran is very bad at feelings. Alistair isn't much better.</p><p>(Major spoilers for Zevran's backstory.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Please read the tags: that mature rating isn't for sex. The story doesn't end dark, but it goes down pretty far, for a good while.
> 
> (Also, many thanks to [not_poignant](http://archiveofourown.org/users/not_poignant/pseuds/not_poignant) for 1am word sprints.)

Zevran stands over Taliesin's body and waits to feel something. Triumph would be understandable, given that he is the one still standing after the fight. Anger would also make sense. Betrayal would be foolish--they are Crows, after all--but emotions are so rarely logical that if he did feel betrayed, it would hardly be unusual. Even some tattered remnant of the love they once shared, or sorrow over the way that love meant nothing in the end, would not be out of place here.

Staring at the corpse at his feet, he feels none of those things. In fact, he feels nothing at all. The mercenary lying a few feet away provoked more of a reaction, though that was only irritation that the man's armor had notched one of his daggers. He doesn't even feel that much for Taliesin.

With a certain detached curiosity, he deliberately calls up his last memory of Rinna. Or rather, of Rinna's body. Nothing.

He goes farther back, to Rinna alive and reaching for him as she giggles under Taliesin. Still nothing.

With a small shock, he realizes Mahariel is talking to him, words some part of him must understand because his mouth is answering. The answers must make sense, too, but somehow, he can't hear himself, or her, or anyone. Somehow, it doesn't even seem strange, and he congratulates himself on maintaining the proper distance, the way he was taught. None of this matters, after all. Why should he feel anything?

There are more questions he doesn't hear, and answers he only knows he's making because he feels his mouth moving and his throat working. Then there are alleys, indistinguishable from any of the dozens of others they've walked since coming to Denerim, and broader streets full of people, and finally a tavern.

He receives another small shock, then, when he looks around and finds himself short one elf and one red-headed bard. Where they went, or when he separated himself from them, he doesn't know, but they're nowhere in this tavern, that's for certain.

Unfortunately, he has _not_ lost a certain blond Ferelden puppy, who is currently hovering at his shoulder and eyeing the tavern's other occupants with deep distrust and a little bit of concern. He isn't wearing his usual armor, only a light coat of leather riveted with iron plates that draws far less attention when wandering the city, but he still somehow looks like Zevran's bodyguard, and more than one person is now edging away from them.

For the first time since he heard Taliesin's voice, Zevran feels something. Irritation, he decides after a moment. Just a bit of irritation, that Alistair has decided to trail after him rather than find a way to pass the afternoon that doesn't involve Zevran.

However mild the irritation, Zevran wishes it would go away again, along with Alistair. He was quite enjoying feeling nothing at all, so why does Alistair insist on ruining it?

Irritation twists and becomes something uglier, something Zevran refuses to acknowledge. He is a Crow, and Taliesin is now as dead as Rinna, and there is no reason he should feel anything at all, except perhaps a desire for a drink and an uncomplicated fuck.

Neither of which Alistair will be able to provide, so Zevran doesn't pay him any attention as he surveys the tavern for a likely target who can meet both needs. It isn't as if he doesn't have coin--Mahariel is more than generous, now that she has money to be generous with--but why pay for a drink if someone else can be persuaded to buy it for him?

Two tables over, a big man in leather armor returns his look with an equally appraising one, and Zevran smiles at him, then lets his smile widen when he gets a smirk in return.

Alistair's hand on his arm wipes the smile away, and Zevran turns to glare at him. "Did you need something?" he asks, narrowing his eyes.

Rather than answer the question, Alistair frowns. "What are you doing?"

"I should think that would be obvious," Zevran says, raising a single mocking eyebrow. "Did you perhaps require an explanation?"

Alistair flushes to the roots of his hair, but his grip on Zevran's arm doesn't relax. "If you...we could..."

"Yes?" Zevran asks sweetly. "We could what?" He knows perfectly well Alistair won't be able to voice even the mildest suggestion aloud, and he feels a nasty pleasure in watching him try to talk around it in stumbling half sentences.

When that begins to pale as entertainment, Zevran interrupts him, cutting across a stuttering attempt to say "cock" that just make him want to scream. "I'm sure that's all very nice," he says kindly, "but why don't you run along now? The adults will be playing, and I see no need to have children underfoot."

Alistair goes white and shrinks inside his armor, his grip loosening as he mumbles an apology that Zevran doesn't stay to hear. Instead, he fixes his gaze on his soon-to-be-friend and picks his way through the crowded tavern, wearing his most inviting smile.

Zevran stops beside him, too close for mere politeness, and the man asks, "Friend of yours?" He points with his chin back to where Alistair was standing.

"Not tonight," Zevran says, letting one eye drop in a brief wink.

The man laughs, which is as good as an invitation. As he sits at the table, sliding across the bench to get closer to his new friend, Zevran glances over his shoulder to see Alistair's reaction. He's not sure what he's expecting or hoping to see, only that it's suddenly important to see it.

But Alistair is gone.

###

The sex is fast and rough, a hard fuck up against the wall behind the tavern that leaves Zevran's mouth bloody where his lips split against his teeth. It hurts, too, and not pleasantly; this isn't the kind of pain that works as a counterpoint to the pleasure to make it all the sweeter. He never makes it to more than half way hard, though the man fucking him in brutal thrusts doesn't seem to notice and certainly doesn't care.

It's exactly what he was looking for, and it isn't enough.

When it's over, Zevran grins and bows as if the pain isn't throbbing all the way to his toes, and goes on his way with a bounce in his step that sends spikes through his body every time his feet hit the ground. His thoughts circle endlessly around Rinna and Taliesin, but despite his inability to clear them from his mind, the memories provoke no more emotion than he might feel over one of Leliana's stories.

He drifts from tavern to inn to back alley for a while, willing himself to be patient as he watches and weighs the people he sees before moving on without speaking to any of them. It isn't difficult to find a dozen men like the first one, men who will use him without concern for anything except their own pleasure, but _thoughtless_ cruelty isn't what he needs tonight.

At some point after midnight, when the thought of seeking out one of the city's Crow masters is beginning to seem like a good idea, Zevran finally finds what he's looking for. The tavern is so nondescript that he almost misses it completely, but once inside, it's clear what sort of clientele the place serves: men and women with money, who value discretion over anything else. No one will ask awkward questions, here.

Zevran scans the other patrons out of habit and pauses on one seated at a table toward the back. He's an older man with a soft smile that doesn't match his hard eyes, and he opens a hand in invitation when Zevran meets his gaze.

There's a room this time, furnished modestly with a bed and table and chairs, all of them sturdy and of good quality. Zevran takes it in with a single glance, assessing potential weapons and escape routes instinctively, as if he has any plans to fight back. When the man grabs him from behind, he struggles only enough for verisimilitude, allowing himself to be bound and gagged so thoroughly he would be hard pressed to slip free even if he wanted to.

The man doesn't do anything so crude as fuck him, but he knows a number of ways to hurt him, and Zevran tries to lose himself in the searing heat of burns and the sharp pain of a blade and the dull throb of bruises. Even if it's far from the worst he's ever suffered, tonight he wants to let go, let it overwhelm him and wash away everything else.

Except that he can't. No matter how hard he tries, he can't forget he's a Crow, can't unlearn a lifetime's worth of lessons. His teeth clench tight around the gag, though he wants to scream, and his mind builds escape plan after escape plan, though he wants to think of nothing at all. Letting go isn't something he knows how to do anymore.

A knock on the door startles both of them, breaking the man's concentration as he carves another line across Zevran's back, and the knife digs in deeper than before. Zevran hisses around the gag, but his teeth stay locked together against any other noise. Behind him, the man waits without speaking, his fingers resting on Zevran's shoulder as they both listen for sounds from outside.

A second knock follows when the first isn't answered, then a third, and the man curses very quietly as he drops his hand. Zevran listens to him cross the room, unable even now to stop gauging angles of attack and the probable direction of a blow.

"What is it?" the man barks through the door. "I'm busy."

The reply is mumbled, too low to be heard through the wood, but Zevran recognizes the voice anyway. His eyes open wide and he tries to speak around the gag, to call a warning-

Too late. The man opens the door only a crack, but a crack is all Alistair needs. A heavy thump--the sound of an armored shoulder hitting a door--and a shout that's both angry and confused, and then Alistair's voice muttering, "Maker save me."

Zevran can't remember the last time he was this angry, full of a rage so pure it freezes rather than burns. Bound as he is, he can't move to pin Alistair with a glare; he can only listen as the third man curses and blusters.

"Get out." The words cut across the tirade, and they're so crisp and commanding that it takes Zevran a moment to realize Alistair is the one speaking.

"You can't-" the man begins.

"Get out," Alistair says again, in that same level, implacable voice. "Get out, _now_."

Whatever expression accompanies the words, the next noise Zevran hears is the door closing, right before Alistair kneels in front of him. He's still dressed in the same light armor from earlier, without the bulk added by his usual heavy plate, but Zevran is startled to realize he doesn't need that extra weight to look intimidating.

Alistair's hands don't shake as he unties the gag, and his face is as blank as it normally is when he fights. As Zevran works his jaw and lips to remind them how to move, Alistair cuts the rest of his bindings, knife slipping carefully between skin and rope so as not to leave even one more mark. That care only makes Zevran angrier, something he wouldn't have thought possible.

He's so angry he can't speak even once his mouth works properly. He pretends that silence is a choice, that he's waiting for Alistair to say something so stupid Zevran can cut him apart without hesitation. Whatever skill he has with a sword, Alistair is woefully unprepared for a battle of words, and his opening shot will be his last.

The silence stretches out, and Zevran can't stop himself from planning the things Alistair _should_ say, if only he were fast enough. Perhaps a sarcastic, "So this is how adults play?"

But when the ropes are gone, what Alistair says in that quiet voice is, "What's wrong?"

It's not at all what Zevran was expecting, and being confused only hardens the icy rage inside him. "What's wrong?" he demands. "What's _wrong_?"

Alistair doesn't say anything, his expression wary, as if he's judging a new opponent on the battlefield.

"You followed me," Zevran growls. "You followed me, and you interfered with something that was none of your concern. Whatever I might say when you fuck me, I am not yours, and you are not my master. I fuck whoever I wish, not whoever you allow."

"You weren't fucking him," Alistair says quietly. He somehow looks both thoughtful and poised to spring, very much like a man in a fight.

"It's still none of your concern," Zevran says, putting all the venom at his command into the words, wanting to see Alistair flinch. "Nothing I do is your concern."

It doesn't earn him so much as a blink. Alistair does pause, but it appears to be nothing more than a chance for him to weigh his next words, and that careful regard doesn't shift as he says, "Who was Taliesin?"

Alistair's dagger is still loose in his hand, not yet sheathed after he cut away the ropes and now apparently forgotten. It's ridiculously easy to snatch it away from him and press the point against his throat, just under his chin.

"No one," Zevran says, his voice now as calm as Alistair's. "He is no one to you."

"Who is he to you?" Alistair asks without flinching.

Zevran slashes the knife across his throat, just hard enough to break the skin without doing any permanent damage. Alistair pales, but he doesn't lose that waiting posture, so Zevran cuts him again, this time across his left cheek. Still nothing. He doesn't even raise a hand to defend himself.

"Are you stupid?" Zevran demands. "Do you _want_ to die?"

"No," Alistair says, and to Zevran's shock, he smiles faintly. "But we're facing an archdemon, and Mahariel is better suited to leading the Grey Wardens than I am."

Angry as he is, it takes Zevran a moment to unravel that, to understand what Alistair is saying: someone will die to bring down the archdemon, and someone will--hopefully--survive to rebuild Ferelden's Grey Wardens. If Mahariel fills the second role, then that leaves the first for Alistair.

Zevran reverses the dagger so the point is no longer against Alistair's cheek, then slaps him hard with the other hand. It's an open-handed blow, deliberately insulting in the way a punch wouldn't be, and it knocks Alistair's head to the side. When he straightens, he's no longer smiling, but he still doesn't look angry, so Zevran slaps him again, directly over the cut dripping blood down his face.

It has no more effect than the first blow, and it makes Zevran so angry he can't even breathe. This time he closes his fist, aiming again for the cut that's now bleeding freely, but when he swings, Alistair leans away and catches his wrist in a bruising grip. Kneeling as they are, neither of them has much in the way of leverage, but Alistair takes advantage of his weight and superior strength to pin both of Zevran's wrists together, forcing him to drop the dagger.

He _still_ doesn't look anything other than watchful, and his voice is quiet when he asks, "Does this help?"

"Does what help?" Zevran asks, not because he cares but because he hopes answering will distract Alistair enough to give him the upper hand.

"Hurting me," Alistair says.

More than anything, Zevran wants to jerk his hands away, but Alistair's grip is as tight as ever. Instead, he sneers. "And if I say yes?"

Alistair rolls his lower lip between his teeth very briefly, his attention turned inward as he considers his answer. Before Zevran can take advantage of his distraction, Alistair's expression firms, and he nods once, as if he's made some important decision.

Then he releases his hold and, while Zevran is still gathering his scattered wits, picks up the dagger to offer it back, hilt first.

If Zevran didn't know better, he'd swear Alistair is some kind of mage, crushing him inside an ever-shrinking prison. He's squeezed down, forced into a space too small to contain everything: something has to give, and the Crows taught him to be sure that something was never him.

He attacks, springing up and forward without warning. Alistair makes one aborted attempt to fight back, his arm coming up for a moment before he drops it back to his side. That hesitation doesn't slow Zevran in the slightest as he comes to his feet and spins to stand behind Alistair, one hand in his hair and the knife once more against his throat.

"Let me tell you who Taliesin _was_ to me," Zevran says conversationally, "and then I will tell you who he is to me now."

He pauses, but Alistair says nothing, only continues to breathe slow and steady. His back is pressed against Zevran's thighs, and the unhurried rise and fall of his chest is infuriating.

"He was my lover," Zevran says, twisting his fingers a little tighter in Alistair's hair just for the brief, pained hitch it puts in his breathing. "An excellent one, too. Far better than you, mi corazón." Alistair doesn't understand Ativan, but he'll understand the derision Zevran puts on what should be an endearment.

"We were compradi together," Zevran continues, "and together in every way, for years. I was seven when House Arainai bought me from my mother, and Taliesin was no older. Do you have a friend like that, mi corazón, a friend who is a part of you for nearly your entire life? A friend who is more your family than anyone who shares your blood?"

There's another brief hitch in Alistair's breathing, for no reason Zevran can see, but he ignores it. "Not that we didn't share blood in a different sense, of course. Sometimes a job requires more than one Crow, and we always worked well together, whatever task we were given."

He lets go of Alistair's hair, smoothing it back down without moving the knife from his throat. "You wish to know who Taliesin is to me? He _was_ my lover, and now he is dead. Now he is nothing to me." The emptiness inside Zevran is proof enough, that echoing lack of grief or anger or love.

Alistair's hair is damp with sweat and a little longer than he normally keeps it. They've been so busy these last weeks, there's hardly been a moment to breathe, let alone attend to such minor things as trimming hair. Zevran twists and untwists a strand, wrapping it lightly around one finger before releasing it, over and over and over again.

"House Arainai purchased a score of children the year they purchased me," he says, watching his hand in Alistair's hair, "and though Taliesin and I were the only ones to survive, we lacked...mmmm...a certain _brilliance_ , you might say. We were good cuchillos, good knives for the Crows, but we would never have been more than that without Rinna."

How long has it been since he said her name? Surely he should feel something, even if saying Taliesin's no longer provokes a reaction. Unlike Taliesin, she did nothing to earn her fate.

"Rinna," he says again, drawing her name out as if that will somehow spark an emotion out of the hollow place that's swallowed everything. "Rinna had all the skills we lacked, and the three of us together were a wonder. In everything." He smiles, making sure Alistair can hear it in his voice. "She was my lover, too. Mine and Taliesin's. She was ours, and we were hers, and there wasn't a Crow master anywhere in Antiva who didn't want to own us."

Zevran makes a loose fist in Alistair's hair. It's definitely long past time to cut it; when the Landsmeet convenes, he must look like a king, not a scruffy little boy.

If he even lives long enough to make it to the Landsmeet. He is so naïve, so careless, it's a wonder he's made it this far.

With a faint sigh, Zevran flattens his hand so he can cup Alistair's forehead. The knife is still steady, and Zevran wonders if it's now been there so long that Alistair no longer feels it. The body can grow accustomed to anything.

"Rinna was beautiful, too," he says, deliberately calling up the memory of her mouth against his, Taliesin's hands on both of them. "The three of us were beautiful together, so of course it could never last. Do you want to know what happened to her?"

With a knife at his throat and Zevran's hand on his forehead, Alistair can't give any kind of answer, but Zevran wasn't looking for one. He strokes his thumb across Alistair's hairline, keeping his head firmly pinned, and says, "She died. She died because she was a threat to someone with power, and in Antiva, the Crows are nearly always the solution to such problems."

Alistair shifts against him, one of the metal plates on his armor scraping across a burn on Zevran's hip, and Zevran tightens his hold, tilting the knife a little so the flat of the blade touches the underside of Alistair's chin. "She died," he says again, "and we killed her, Taliesin and I, because we were told that she betrayed the Crows. So now she is nothing to me, too."

The burn on his hip is throbbing, but he ignores it, the way he's ignoring the dozens of other pains that try to demand his attention. He is a Crow, and he learned to close his mind off from physical pain even before he met Rinna.

"And now I think perhaps I should save myself the trouble," Zevran says, pressing the flat of the blade harder against Alistair's chin. "Which is what you are, mi corazón: rather a lot of trouble. I could do to you what I did to them, and then you can be nothing to me, too."

He's expecting at least another twitch, if not an attempt to fight back, but Alistair's breathing has returned to slow and steady.

"Did you hear me?" Zevran demands, moving the blade just far enough that Alistair can talk.

Alistair works his jaw for a moment, then says simply, "Yes."

"Are you sure you don't wish to die?" Zevran asks. "Because you seem bent upon it."

This time, Alistair doesn't say anything, though the dagger is still far enough away that he could.

When the silence hurts more than any of the burns or bruises on his body, Zevran digs his fingernails hard into Alistair's forehead and barks, "Answer me!"

There's another brief pause before Alistair says quietly, "I don't want to die."

"You'll pardon me if I find that hard to believe," Zevran says, putting as much sarcasm as he can muster into the words. "People who do not wish to die generally are not so calm with a knife at their throat."

"You won't kill me," Alistair says, with absolute certainty.

Zevran puts the knife back against his throat, so close the blade probably nicks his skin. "And how will you stop me?"

"I don't need to," Alistair says, pressing his head back against Zevran's chest to give himself room to speak. "You won't kill me."

He's being crushed again, smothered in some mage's prison that's closed in so tight his bones are breaking, the shattered ends stabbing into his lungs. It wouldn't take more than a flick of his wrist to cut Alistair's throat, and then maybe he can be completely empty, full of the nothingness that suits a real Crow.

But he isn't a real Crow now, and perhaps he never was.

The dagger hits the door with a solid thump, sinking halfway to the hilt. Before it's even stopped quivering, Zevran has turned away and stalked across the room to the table, where he braces his hands against the edge and lets his head hang down. He still can't breathe, and every part of him aches.

Behind him, Alistair climbs slowly to his feet, leather creaking and metal plates occasionally grating against each other, followed by more rustling as he settles his sword belt back into place. Then a brief silence before the sound of his footsteps warns Zevran he's approaching.

He considers a number of violent responses if Alistair touches him, but none of them turn out to be necessary: the footsteps stop a little ways away, well out of arm's reach.

"Did she betray the Crows?" Alistair asks.

It's not what Zevran was expecting. "What?"

"You said..." Alistair hesitates, the first time tonight he's sounded like the man Zevran has grown accustomed to, as opposed to this wary, self-possessed stranger. "You said you were _told_ she betrayed the Crows. Did she?"

"No," Zevran snaps. "We were given a lie, which is hardly uncommon. A cuchillo isn't owed the truth. We are knives, not the hands that wield them."

"Ah." Impossible to tell what Alistair's feeling from that small sound, and Zevran scowls at the table.

"Taliesin knew," he says, wanting to shake Alistair's calm somehow. If Alistair thinks of this as a fight, keeping himself controlled and ready for anything, then it's a fight Zevran means to win. "He knew the whole time."

"Did you?" Alistair asks.

"No, but what does that matter to you? She begged me for her life, and I did nothing to save her. Do you think I would treat you any differently?"

Alistair doesn't answer as he steps forward and puts his hand on Zevran's back, fitting it between the cuts and the burns so he's not touching any of them. His hand is very warm.

Knife or no knife, there are a dozen ways Zevran could hurt or kill him from this position. He doesn't move, not even when Alistair's hip comes to rest against his, his hand drifting up to curl around the back of Zevran's neck.

"Tell me what you need," Alistair says quietly.

It takes everything Zevran has to keep his voice level. "I need you to leave me in peace."

"I can't leave you alone with someone like that," Alistair says. His voice shakes a little, another glimpse of the real Alistair. Or at least, the Alistair that Zevran expects. "I can't."

"You asked what I need," Zevran says. "What I need tonight is nothing you can give me."

Alistair takes a deep breath that seems to go on forever, in in in and then out out out. When it's done, the last bit of air expelled, his hand moves down Zevran's neck to his shoulder and squeezes hard, right over one of the burns.

Zevran gasps and twists away on instinct, putting the table between himself and Alistair. They stare at each other with mirroring wide-eyed expressions until Alistair looks away, a flush climbing his face. "I'm sorry," he says. His confidence is gone now, the guilt and shame back in force. "I thought...I mean...I shouldn't have-"

"Stop," Zevran says. He has what he wanted, Alistair once more stuttering and uncertain, only to discover he hates it more than ever. "No apology is necessary, but this is why I say that what I need tonight is not something you can give." He flicks his fingers in Alistair's direction, indicating his hunched shoulders and agonized expression. "I need someone who will not flinch."

"If it's what you need, I can do it," Alistair says, all in a rush. His hands are knotted in fists at his sides.

"I doubt that," Zevran says softly. "You can hardly stand to do it once."

"Because I thought you didn't want it," Alistair says. His voice is still a little too fast and high, but it's coming down. "You pulled away, and I thought..." He doesn't finish the sentence, just imitates Zevran's gesture in reverse, turning his hand briefly palm up. "If...if it's really what you want, I can do it."

"Is this something you like?" Zevran asks, curious if he's stumbled into another one of Alistair's so-carefully-hidden desires.

But Alistair is shaking his head vehemently. "No."

"Then leave, and let me find someone who does."

"I don't have to like it," Alistair says. "Unless you want me t-to...umm...after..."

"Fuck me?" Zevran asks, too tired to make Alistair say it. "No."

"Then why does it matter if I like it?" He's calm again, centered as if he's in the middle of a fight, despite the blush that hasn't quite faded.

Zevran stares at him, unable to think of a way to explain. He doesn't want Alistair doing things for him, not things that provide him with nothing in return. Sex is all well and good, but this? This accrues a debt, and debts can be called at the most inconvenient times.

Without breaking eye contact, Alistair steps around the table. Zevran holds his ground, though a part of him wants to move and keep the table between them, and when Alistair's hand closes on his shoulder again, he doesn't flinch away from the pain. He can feel it down to his fingers and across his chest, nipples hardening in a reaction that has nothing of pleasure in it even though he wants more of it.

It's too long and not long enough before Alistair lets go, and Zevran has to take a few deep breaths of his own. "A pity you cut the rope," he says at last, "but I suppose we can improvise something."

To his surprise, Alistair shakes his head. "No."

Zevran gets hold of his temper. Barely. "Then leave, and let me find someone who can do this for me."

"What?" Alistair asks, frowning in confusion. Before Zevran can answer, his face clears, his expression firm again. "I can do this, but I won't tie you. That's...that's all I ask. I can't, not if you're bound."

It's not exactly what Zevran wants, but he weighs it carefully and decides it's a requirement he can live with. On one condition.

He crosses the room to the pile of cut rope and extracts the gag, holding it up so Alistair can see it. "Then this is my requirement." He gets a dubious look, so he adds, "My hands will be free. If I wish to stop, I can remove it."

Shoulders tense, Alistair looks from him to the gag, and Zevran can see him performing his own calculations, feeling out the limits of his discomfort. Eventually, his posture changes back to relaxed and ready, and he nods. "All right."

Zevran feels the tension leave him, the relief so intense he's dizzy with it. On one level, the intensity of his reaction bothers him: it reminds him that the only time he willingly surrendered control, it was to Alistair. At the same time, he needs this too much to care.

The gag is damp and cold, mildly disgusting, but it's far from the worst thing Zevran's ever had in his mouth. He has to show Alistair what to do, wadding up cloth to fill his mouth before tying the last strip around his head to hold it all in place, and when he's done, Alistair hesitates a moment, looking concerned again. Then his nostrils flare as he draws in a nearly silent breath, and he brushes his fingers across Zevran's eyelids to close them.

Zevran doesn't resist.

Alistair starts slow, his fingers tentative as they trace the edges of a burn or follow the line of a cut, and maybe it's a good thing Zevran is gagged, or he might be tempted to sarcasm. Now his only options are to wait or end things entirely.

Gradually, those gentle touches grow firm, no longer lingering at the edges but instead pressing into the center of the burns and dragging along the entire length of each cut. Alistair doesn't add any injuries, but he takes advantage of every single one that's already there. Soon enough, Zevran forgets about sarcasm and how much he wanted to be tied, because all he can think about is the pain and his desperate fight to breathe through his nose.

When Alistair drives his thumbnail into the center of the worst burn, across the back of Zevran's thigh, he can't stop himself from falling to his knees. He doesn't land as hard as he could because Alistair catches his arm, but it's still hard enough to make his knees ache.

This will be the end of it, Zevran knows: Alistair is struggling already, and so clear a sign of how much it hurts will be too much for him. Indeed, Alistair is already gripping his chin, turning his face up.

"Look at me," Alistair says, and Zevran blinks open eyes that feel glued together.

Pale as he is, Alistair doesn't reach for the knot on the gag as he studies Zevran's face, and whatever he finds there makes him nod and say, "All right," very softly.

The pain gets worse. Alistair finds every mark on his skin, scratching and pinching and prodding until blood is running down Zevran's sides and he feels like he's been flayed. He doesn't even realize he's falling again until his hands hit the floor, and again Alistair's quick grab is the only thing that saves him from landing face first.

This time Alistair goes down on one knee in front of him, hand firm as he lifts Zevran's head. It's too much effort to open his eyes, and Alistair doesn't say anything. His fingers loop through the gag without tugging, but when Zevran shakes his head, he doesn't argue.

Every moment that follows stretches out in a way Zevran recognizes; this is hardly the first time he's been tortured. There's a pattern to it, a rhythm to the pain, his body screaming that it can't withstand more and his mind overriding that. At every pause, he thinks that it shouldn't be possible to hurt more than he already does, and every time Alistair starts up again, Zevran learns how much more pain there is.

A Crow who breaks is no longer a Crow, but the masters who trained him recognized that sometimes it was easier to withstand pain if the body was allowed some kind of release. Crying or screaming under torture would never meet with approval, but it was acceptable as long as the screams were wordless.

So when the first scream pushes past his throat, he lets the gag smother it rather than fight it. Nor does he fight the tears that burn his eyes and drip on the floor, occasionally splashing against the backs of his hands. It doesn't matter that with his mouth blocked and his nose running, every breath is a struggle. He is a Crow, and he can't cry for anyone's death, but he can cry for this.

Eventually his arms give out, Alistair's hand on his shoulder catching him before he breaks his nose on the floor. That hand lifts him up to sit on his heels, holding him steady as he tries to keep his balance. This time, Alistair doesn't ask before slipping the knot on the gag and pulling the wadded cloth from Zevran's mouth.

Zevran leans drunkenly against his chest, eyes closed and mind finally disconnected from everything. Distantly, he recognizes the feeling, knows that he's treading right on the edge of that place where he'll do whatever Alistair asks, where he'll want to do whatever Alistair asks, but right now, he can't remember why that ever frightened him. Under his ear, Alistair's chest is vibrating, and Zevran realizes he's singing, very softly, as he wipes Zevran's face with a rough cloth. After a moment of concentration, he recognizes the words to a Ferelden lullaby, and he smiles, wondering which of them it's meant to soothe.

When Alistair puts a vial to his lips, Zevran drinks without protest, not even bothering to make a face at the bitter taste of elfroot. It's strong, too, curling his tongue and freezing his throat, burns healing and cuts closing before he's even finished swallowing.

"Mahariel won't thank you for wasting one of her good potions," Zevran says after he's finished it. His throat may be physically healed, but his voice is still rough.

"I doubt she'd call it a waste," Alistair says mildly.

Zevran snorts in disagreement, turning his face into Alistair's neck, breathing in the smell of sweat and leather. Alistair's hand skims down his ribs to rest on his hip, a light hold he could break if he wanted to.

He doesn't.


	2. Chapter 2

Alistair leaves him alone to get dressed and goes downstairs to settle up with the innkeeper for the cost of the room. Zevran amuses himself by imagining the conversation, Alistair no doubt blushing and stammering, the innkeeper bored and disinterested. If he'd had any doubts about his initial impression of this inn, that it was a place where no one asked questions, they've now been laid to rest. Gag or no gag, someone must have heard him screaming, and no one came to investigate.

Even after the potion, Zevran isn't moving very fast, and so he's mildly surprised that Alistair hasn't returned by the time he's finished dressing. He could wait in the room, he supposes, but there's nothing here he wants to see again, and too many memories to make it comfortable.

Despite the exhaustion sapping his strength, habit makes him descend the stairs silently, and so he catches sight of the ridiculously large bag of coin on the counter before it's swept away by the innkeeper. Alistair jumps a little when he sees him, looking guilty, but Zevran waits until they're out in the street before he says, "You might have the room for an entire year, for that much coin."

Alistair shrugs, looking guiltier. "I...I paid him what I thought it was worth."

It's a lie, and Zevran squints at him until Alistair growls and says, "I paid him to send a runner for me, the next time that man is there."

Zevran sighs. "The one you chased from his room?"

The scowl he receives in return is thunderous. "Yes."

"He did nothing I didn't want," Zevran points out.

They walk in silence for a while, Alistair frowning at the road as if it's offended him. Zevran thinks the conversation is over by the time Alistair asks, "Did it matter to him, that you wanted it?"

One corner of Zevran's mouth curls in a smile. "No." Alistair nods as if he's won the argument, and Zevran bites back another sigh as he says, "You cannot fight every wolf you meet."

"I can't fight every wolf in the world," Alistair corrects. "But I won't walk away if I meet one."

Zevran has no energy to fight with him, and probably no argument Alistair would find compelling even if he cared to make it. They walk the rest of the way back to Eamon's estate in silence, and they part at their separate doors with only a nod.

Tired as he is, Zevran knows he won't be able to sleep for a while yet, so he trades his armor for a loose shirt and trousers before beginning a series of stretches. The elfroot will have healed the damage, but he needs to prove to himself that his body is once again whole.

Out in the hallway, a door opens and closes very quietly, and Zevran pauses, curious. At this hour of the night, no one should be up, and certainly no one should be sneaking around. Zevran has a sinking feeling he knows who it is, but when no one knocks at his door, he unfolds himself and goes to peek out into the corridor.

He looks out just in time to see Alistair disappear around a corner. Curiosity wins over exhaustion, so Zevran follows, closing his door with all the stealth Alistair lacks.

It isn't difficult to shadow him, though it does give Zevran pause as he realizes exactly how unaware he was this afternoon. Alistair must have followed him on his hunt through the city, and he never once noticed, too focused on finding someone who could give him what he needed.

The irony isn't lost on him, that Alistair turned out to be more than capable in that regard. Zevran rubs his shoulder where the burn used to be--the first one Alistair touched--then drops his hand when he realizes what he's doing.

They wind up in the private chantry Eamon uses when it's only family present. There's a larger one in another wing of the manor, gilded and elaborate, designed to demonstrate the arl's power as much as his devotion to the Maker, but this is the one Eamon uses when he wants to pray rather than impress.

Apparently, it's also the one Alistair prefers, and he must have used it in the past because he navigates the benches easily even in the dark. He lights a single candle at the altar, then goes to one knee and clasps his hands together, dropping his forehead to rest on his interlaced fingers.

A whisper of sound makes it as far as the door where Zevran lingers, the words indistinguishable from this distance. Dark as it is, it's a simple matter to slip closer, setting his feet down carefully so that not even the scuff of a sole on stone will betray his presence. Still, he's almost on top of Alistair before he can make out the words.

"Though all before me is shadow," Alistair whispers, "yet shall the Maker be my guide."

Zevran has never believed in the Maker, or in any power higher than the guildmaster, but his scalp tightens at the desperation in Alistair's voice.

"I shall not be left to wander the drifting roads of the Beyond," Alistair continues, "for there is no darkness in the Maker's Light, and nothing that He has wrought shall be lost."

His voice breaks on the last word, and the candlelight catches a tear as it splashes on his knee, darkening the fabric of his trousers. Zevran stares at it, and at the other dark patches that appear as more tears fall. Looking at Alistair's face feels like too great a violation right now. His mere presence is a violation, but his feet won't move.

"I am not alone," Alistair murmurs, his voice unsteady, and Zevran thinks the world is better off without a god who could ignore this. "Even as I stumble on the path with my eyes closed, yet I see the Light is here."

At last Zevran persuades his feet to move, and he backs out of the chapel twice as carefully as he entered, nearly holding his breath until he's in the hallway once again. He doesn't run to his room, but he does walk faster than normal.

Sleep is now an impossibility, and Zevran doesn't even try. Instead, he cleans his gear and sharpens his knives and practices as best he can without an opponent or a training dummy. Alistair returns to his room before dawn, his footsteps barely audible. Zevran pauses until his door closes behind him, then resumes practicing.

After dawn, when the others have risen and gone down to breakfast, Zevran crosses the hall and let's himself into Alistair's room. It's much the same as his own: perhaps a little larger, the rug a little more expensive, but still a little sparse for a man who might be king, two months from now, except for the small matter of an archdemon, and a Blight. Zevran tries to imagine Alistair dead, and something cold settles in his chest. He brushes the thought away, the same way he brushes aside thoughts of Rinna and Taliesin, all of them equally painful.

That gives him pause. How strange that those memories should hurt now, when they didn't yesterday. He almost wishes for the emptiness back, almost hates Alistair for ruining it, except he knows none of this is Alistair's fault.

He sits on the bed and waits, deliberately thinking about nothing at all. Waiting is something he has plenty of practice with, and he knows how to stay alert without exhausting himself. Even if Alistair doesn't return until tonight, which is unlikely, Zevran will be ready.

That trained patience proves to be unnecessary: Alistair returns soon enough, with a wrapped bundle in his hands. He almost drops that bundle when he sees Zevran, and the cloth slips enough to reveal an apple and what might be a loaf of bread.

"Something for later?" Zevran asks lightly, gesturing at the food.

Alistair turns red and looks away. "It...it was for you, but then I thought maybe I shouldn't wake you up."

"How convenient," Zevran says, because teasing Alistair is far better than thinking about how such a gesture makes him feel, "as this is the time when I usually eat."

That gets him a shy smile, and Zevran thinks with startling clarity, _This needs to end._ Because nothing about his relationship with Alistair is simple anymore, and there are no clear lines, and neither of them has any idea what they're doing.

But when he tries to say that, what comes out is, "Did the cheese survive the trip, or did you eat it all?"

Alistair's smile broadens, still sweet but no longer shy, and the same voice shouts in his head, _This needs to end **now.**_

He ignores it and takes the bundle from Alistair, opening it in his lap to find that the cheese did, in fact, survive the trip from the main hall. "Eat with me?" he says, patting the bed beside him.

Alistair sits but doesn't eat, shaking his head when Zevran offers a piece of cheese. "I already ate," he says.

He's not lying, but he also doesn't usually turn down food, much less cheese. Zevran tries not to frown at him, or at the way he watches so intently as Zevran eats, as if he's waiting for a sign of something. Pain, perhaps, as if he didn't give Zevran enough elfroot last night to cure anything short of death. If Zevran were in pain, it would be none of Alistair's doing, not now.

They eat in silence, except for the voice in Zevran's head chanting, _End it, end it, end it_ , which he ignores. Or tries to, but it doesn't make it easy to collect his thoughts and remember what he came in here to say.

It doesn't get any easier to focus once he's finished eating, because he's no sooner dusted off his hands than Alistair is dragging him forward into a hard kiss. This is also not what Zevran came here for, but he doesn't fight it. If this is what Alistair wants, then Zevran is happy to give it to him. Sex is always preferable to stewing over his own thoughts.

Not that Alistair gives him much of a chance to do anything but lie there. He strips Zevran naked so fast the shirt tears a little, and then his hands and mouth are everywhere, touching all the places he touched last night, somehow frantic and gentle at the same time. He doesn't even hold still long enough to undress himself, or for Zevran to do it for him.

When he's kissed nearly every inch of Zevran's body, his mouth closes around Zevran's cock, sucking and licking until he's completely hard. His body is pinning Zevran's legs, and his mouth is hot and significantly more talented than it was a few months ago, and Zevran would much rather do this than think.

Alistair lifts his head enough to say, "Give me your hands."

Zevran reaches down, but only to tug on Alistair's hair. As good as it feels to let Alistair suck him, he knows what Alistair likes best. "I want you to fuck me," he says, because it's true, but also because he needs to find some small way to make this more about Alistair than about him. He needs this relationship back on the right track, though last night made him realize exactly how far they've drifted.

"Let me do this," Alistair says, ducking his head back down to lick the head of Zevran's cock. "I want to do this."

He always was a terrible liar. Even his half truths are obvious to anyone who knows him.

Without warning, Zevran twists out from under him, using surprise to his advantage to flip Alistair onto his back. His hand closes on Alistair's groin a moment before Alistair catches his wrist and pulls him away, but a moment is all he needs.

Alistair is flushed, his eyes fixed on a point over Zevran's shoulder, his mouth pressed into a thin line.

"Why start this if you didn't want it?" Zevran asks, careful to keep his tone curious rather than accusing.

It's not clear for a moment whether Alistair will actually answer him, but then he sighs and says, "Because I wanted to know you were all right."

"Why would I not be?" Zevran asks. "So much elfroot would cure nearly anything."

"I needed to _know_ ," Alistair says. His gaze is almost a challenge when he finally meets Zevran's eyes. "It's not the same, just knowing that a potion _should_ work."

Zevran remembers his own exercises last night, stretching and twisting to prove to himself that no injury remained. Arguing with Alistair about this is pointless, because he understands it far too well.

"Why not simply ask?"

"I thought you'd laugh at me," Alistair mutters, looking away again.

There isn't much Zevran can say to that. It's very possible he would have laughed, or found some other way to divert Alistair's attention so he could try once again to push this relationship back into the box it was supposed to fit inside.

Words are useless here, Zevran knows, as they so often are with Alistair. Perhaps with good reason, given Zevran's own tendency to tell whatever version of the truth suits him.

He slips out of Alistair's now-loose grip and stands, holding his arms out wide so his body is on display as he turns in a slow circle.

"Don't mock me," Alistair says softly, and it sounds a little too much like begging for Zevran's comfort.

"I am not," he says just as softly, completing his turn. Alistair is sitting on the edge of the bed, watching him. "You wished to know I was healed, to see it for yourself. Now you can see."

"I want to know," Alistair says. "Not just see."

When he reaches out to touch, Zevran steps closer, letting him run his fingers wherever he wants. It's not sexual, or at least, it's only vaguely sexual. By now, Zevran's body has made a rather embarrassing connection between sex and Alistair's touch, and it's difficult not to be a little aroused by the contact, but he thinks he does a reasonably good job of keeping it under control.

"Better?" he asks eventually.

"Some," Alistair says, curling one hand around Zevran's waist.

There are so many things Zevran could say right now, so many ways he could move this conversation, but there's only one that feels right. It's not the one he wants, and maybe not the one Alistair wants, but they're words he needs to say.

"Last night," he says, and Alistair's hand tightens. "You could have said no." Alistair shakes his head, and Zevran catches his face in both hands, forcing his head up. "I am not the only one allowed to say it," he says forcefully. "You could have said no."

"I didn't want to," Alistair blurts out. "Or...I did, but I didn't." He makes an irritated noise deep in his throat and tries again. "I wanted to give you that, even if I didn't like it."

The voice in Zevran's head has abandoned words and is just screaming endlessly now. He ignores it and whispers, "Thank you." His throat tries to close, but he swallows once and makes himself finish. Failure to acknowledge the debt won't make it any less. "I owe you a great deal for that."

"You don't owe me anything," Alistair says. He closes his eyes and his voice drops to a whisper as he says, "But I can't do it again. Not...not today. Not soon."

"Not ever?" Zevran asks.

"Not soon," Alistair says. "If...it that's what you needed, I would...I would try. But please don't ask me for that today."

His eyes are still closed, and he jerks a little when Zevran leans down to rest their foreheads together. "Not soon," Zevran agrees.

This relationship is so far beyond its proper boundaries, Zevran can't even imagine how he could get it back where it's supposed to be. But as he gets Alistair undressed and into bed, as he stretches himself out with his head on Alistair's chest and Alistair's arms tight around him, he's not entirely sure he cares.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm...sorry?


End file.
